Restaurants with counter service, such as sushi restaurants, are a beehive of activity with counter people hustling about. There may be as many as three or four people behind an average counter, and more in a large restaurant. Sushi restaurants, because of their specialized menu, serve as many as six different types of fish per customer. Generally, one sushi chef moves along a counter selecting the different fish, and with several chefs doing the same thing there is a lot of lost motion. If each chef could remain in one place and have the fish delivered to him there would be less confusion.
One possible solution is found in U.S. Pat. No. 3,610,161, issued to Wishart, where a conveyor system delivers food from a kitchen area to an eating area and returns dishes from the eating area to the kitchen area. A magnetic conveyer which includes a plurality of dollies that travel a prescribed path and a similar number of serving dishes magnetically connected to the dollies is shown in the present invention. Each dolly has its own drive means and is programmed to travel a particular course. Separating the dollies from the dishes is a non-magnetic surface.
The use of conveyors to transport food in a restaurant is well known, however, magnetic conveyors to transport food are less known. The Wishart patent is a good example of a magnetic food transport. Magnetic conveyors for other purposes are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,882,791, issued to Youngscap, U.S. Pat. No. 4,518,078, issued to Garrett, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,624,617, issued to Belna.
The Youngscap patent is both a magnetic and fluid energy transmission system. Ferromagnetic slugs spaced in a pipe line are magnetically coupled to carriers traveling on the exterior of the pipe line. A fluid pumped through the pipe line moves the slugs.
A wafer transport system is disclosed in Garret patent where an exterior magnetic device moves an interior magnetic device connected to a wafer support. The magnetic coupling allows the wafer support to move wafers in and out of a sputtering zone.
Another wafer transport system is disclosed in Belas where a car is levitated and propelled along a track using magnetic forces.